Should government be doing anything, then? I maintain that it isn't that Canadian farmers aren't competitive. They are. The problem is that we lack competitive farm policy in Canada vis-à-vis the rest of the world.
Frank is absolutely right that the remarks you folks made today are quite divergent from a lot of the ones we have heard in the country. Be that as it may—that's fine—what do we do in a case in which the Americans' commodity price program right now has durum priced at about $2 over the market in the U.S., which is going to clearly force an increase in durum production in the U.S., while we don't? Do we just get out of that commodity? What do we do as a country when other governments are pumping money into their agriculture, and one is the worst—to say nothing of the divergence between provinces?
Brian goes on a lot about Alberta, but the fact of the matter is, second to Quebec in this country, Alberta has the most subsidies to the farm level, even in the livestock industry. Where I come from—I'm speaking of the livestock industry, not your industry—the fact that they're subsidized in Alberta is driving my producers out of business.
So what do we do in the country as a national government to try to level the playing field across the country and, as a Canadian government, to level the playing field internationally? If other governments are going to be in this game of supporting their farmers, do we withdraw entirely? Is that what you're asking us to do?
I agree on Matt's point. AgriStability—ignore CAIS—has worked right for young farmers. There are problems with both of them; we heard a lot of that across the country. But what do we do to fix it? Do we want a bottom-line safety net for the farm community? Or do we want to go all free enterprise, with no safety nets? And if we want to go free enterprise, fine, let's do it. But what do we do to fix the safety nets and the bottom line, if we want one?